Obamas former chief economist Larry Summers thinks that one way to break Americas fall off the over-reported fiscal cliff is to raise taxes to the level they were under Clintons administration. Echoing Paul Krugmans 90% tax rate nostalgia and pointing out that it was conservative icon Ronald Reagan who cut taxes to 50%, he said, Its hard to believe that raising the top tax rate to 39.6 percent  where it was under President Clinton  will do grievous damage to the economy. Of course, Reagan also cut the top tax rate to 28% in his second term, but thats beside the point.

Raising already existing taxes is only one way to cushion our fall. Summers, a professor at Obamas alma mater, is certain that soon well have taxes on carbon, energy and junk food. In fact, he was surprised that Americans didnt yet have a tax on carbon and energy, considering that carbon and energy usage is directly related to the solar cycles that affect global temperatures. Or so liberals think. Taxing such usage will surely convince the sun to alter its behavior so that the average global temperature will go down a couple degrees and stop all the hurricanes from ruining everybodys lives. And if taxing doesnt work, just tax more.

I will probably catch a lot of flack for saying this, but the proposed junk food tax is one of several situations where when we don’t control ourselves, our meddling government steps in and does it for us.

Finally - the freeloading democrat base would have some skin in the game (but still using our money to pay those taxes).

BTW, seriously, what are the democrats willing to sacrifice for the fiscal cause, anyway? All I've heard about so far is taxing Republicans more. What about their "fair share?" What are they going to contribute????

The Mao suit: ideology expressed through dress Mao Zedong recognized the power of dress to project nationalism and ideology. On 1 October 1949 at the grand ceremony in Beijing marking the founding of the People's Republic of China, he wore a modified form of the Sun Yat-sen suit. Mao had worn this style of suit since 1927 but it was only after 1949 that it was adopted by the majority of the Chinese population. It is known in the West as the Mao suit.

I never said the government had the right to control us. I said the government will control us if we don’t control ourselves.

If we Americans would control our eating habits and not burden the the healthcare system with self-induced illness and diseases, the government do-gooders would have no or at least less reason to get in our lives about it.

We gripe about Americans, who lacking self disipline, don’t work and become a burden on the system. But its somewhat of the same thing when we as Americans are making ourselves fatter and fatter and sicker and sicker, due lack of self discipline in our eating patterns, put burdens on each other in terms of the high cost of health care and health insurance.

I paraphrase Ralph Waldo Emmerson who said, Every man talks about improving society, but no MAN improves. Meaning to me
that society is made up of individuals. The more self discipline each individal has, the better the society we will have. I hate government control, but there are things we do or don’t do to bring some of this government control upon ourselves. Just sayin.

“If we Americans would control our eating habits and not burden the the healthcare system with self-induced illness and diseases, the government do-gooders would have no or at least less reason to get in our lives about it.”\

And there you have it. You have already accepted their base assumption that it is acceptable to approach health care as a collective. It used to be that insurance was a product that allowed individuals to pool risk, then it transitioned to a collective, socialistic system of care.

By accepting that argument as your starting point, you make it acceptable to allow for a ruling class to dictate any aspect of our lives that affect the cost of that care. There is no limit!

The pact the tobacco companies signed with the government to reimburse it for years of sick smokers - the catch is not a single penny has come from any tobacco company. The $200+ 25 year agreement is paid 100% by smokers with a 45cent per pack "tax" -

So when you hear talk abut the tobacco industry settlement and paying the government remember, only smokers are paying for it.

Gabz explained it well. Basically, the $500/hr “evil” big tobacco company lawyers were brilliant and took advantage of the greedy state attorney generals. They cut them in as partners. Gubmint makes more money off cigs than the companies who make them. Billions.

The states used the money and collateralized it in tobacco bond offerings to plug budget deficits.

Disclaimer:
Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual
posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its
management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the
exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.